People In Organisations

Question 1

What do they want the future workforce to be ?

Answer 1

They will highlight shortages, surpluses and competency (skills and education) gaps.

Question 2

What are the main drivers for workforce planning?

Answer 2

Business objectives
Labour market
Demographic and social change
Technological change

Question 3

What are business objectives?

Answer 3

Development and change of business objectives; if they need to change something to increase sales.

Question 4

What is labour market?

Answer 4

Labour market trends have implications for recruitment and retention of staff.

Question 5

What is demographic and social change?

Answer 5

Demographic change such as the ageing population in the UK is affecting both demand for products and services and workforce supply.

Question 6

What is technological change?

Answer 6

Technological change is leading to large changes in ways of working and the skills needed in the workforce; ict skills and updated machines.

Question 7

What are benefits of workforce planning?

Answer 7

Training
Employee retention
Diversity policies
Staff performance and absence

Question 8

What is the formal description recruitment process?

Answer 8

Every job should have a job description that explains the tasks involved in the job, the job title, responsibilities attached to the job, place of work and employment conditions (holidays, salary etc)
Next is the preparation of a job specification, this describes the skills, knowledge and experience needed to complete this job.

Question 9

What is internal methods of recruitment?

Answer 9

Finding someone already employed in the firm to fill a vacancy.

Question 10

What are advantages of internal recruitment?

Answer 10

They will already know the company and its methods of working therefore they’re likely to settle into a job.
Cost of recruitment is reduced as theres no need for external advertisements and all the administrative costs for dealing with applications.
It will increase motivation within the workforce.

Question 11

What are the methods of external recruitment?

Answer 11

This will depend on the vacancy/vacancies.
Recruitment agencies
Head hunters
Local papers

Question 12

What is psychometric testing?

Answer 12

This is used to test someone’s ability, personality and interest so these are useful for sifting out large numbers of applicants at an early stage which will save both time and money.

Question 13

What is staff appraisal?

Answer 13

Staff should regularly be appraised so once every six months or an annual basis in which the staff members performance is analysed normally against performance targets. They’ll be judged on:
Tasks completed,number of complaints, performance of subordinates, management of budget etc.

Question 14

What are financial incentives?

Answer 14

Paying someone to do work and the better they do, the more money they get.

Question 15

What are some examples of financial benefits?

Answer 15

Wages, salaries, profit related pay, fringe benefits

Bonus schemes: sales bonus, performance bonus, Christmas bonus, profit share.

Question 16

What are non financial incentives?

Answer 16

Encouraging people to do things well without encouraging them with money

Question 17

What are some examples of non financial incentives?

Answer 17

Job enrichment, job enlargement, communication, empowerment, quality circles, training, autonomous work groups and the single status workplace.

Question 18

What is the motivation theory by Taylor?

Answer 18

Scientific management.
This is the idea that people will do as little as they can and won’t do anything unless they’re getting paid for it. So money is the only thing that motivates them. Money paid is directly correlational to the output achieved.
A managers job is to tell employees what to do and workers job is to do what they’re told and get paid accordingly. This is probably best linked to piece rate as a financial incentive. A weakness of this is that he’s assuming everyone wants to be treated like this.

Question 19

What is maslows theory?

Answer 19

Maslow’s hierarchy of needs,this consists of two parts: the classification of human needs and consideration of how the classes are related to each other.
Five levels of the hierarchy: psychological needs, safety needs, social needs, esteem needs and self actualisation

Question 20

What is herzberg’s theory?

Answer 20

Herzberg’s two factor theory:
Hygiene factors, hygiene factors are things like good company policy, supervision, working conditions, pay and relations with fellow employees. They don’t motivate as such but if they’re poor then workers will get dissatisfied.
Motivating factors are things like interesting work, personal achievement, recognition of achievement and scope for more responsibility and personal development.

Question 21

What is McGregor’s theory?

Answer 21

McGregor’s X and Y theory.
X workers could be described as the following: individuals who dislike work, lack ambition, dislike responsibility, prefer to be led. Individuals who desire security.
Y workers could be characterised as: consider effort at work just like rest or play, don’t dislike work, seek responsibility and are usually well motivated.

Question 22

What is workforce planning?

Answer 22

Workforce planning is about trying to predict the future demand for skills within the business so they look at the present workforce and hire and fire depending on the skills they think they’ll need for the future

Question 23

What are autocratic leaders?

Answer 23

Give orders which have to obeyed without question. They’re probably a theory x manager so they don’t really like work. They don’t really consider Maslow’s higher needs such as self-esteem and self- actualisation or herzberg’s motivating factors. This type of managers is effective when rapid restructuring is required.

Question 24

What is directive leadership?

Answer 24

Based on the idea that all managers in a chai of command are supervisors. The directive manager will tell their direct subordinates what their roles and tasks are and what is expected of them. They’ll tell them basically how to do the job and then they’ll monitor performance and achievement of standards.

Question 25

What is a democratic leader?

Answer 25

These type of managers talks with subordinates in the decision making process so they’re involved with managers in designing their jobs and the tasks involved. These are theory Y managers so they care what’s going on and have ambition and are willing to work.

Question 26

What is missionary leadership?

Answer 26

Leaders driven by beliefs can be regarded S missionary leaders. They must have an organisation and employees behind them that also have the same set of beliefs.

Question 27

What is laissez faire leadership?

Answer 27

‘Leave well alone’ middle managers and subordinates are just left to get on with their jobs and given the minimum of guidance, they succeed or fall on their own.

Question 28

What are bureaucratic managers?

Answer 28

Bureaucratic managers focus on developing the specialisation of jobs and departments, they have a reliance on formal procedures and paperwork, and clearly marked status.

Question 29

What are the factors that determine internal structure?

Answer 29

Views of management
Communication system
The industry
Traditions of the business
Skills of the workforce

Question 30

What are the component parts of internal

Answer 30

Layers of hierarchy
Chains of command
Levels of responsibility
Span of control

Question 31

What are the typical organisational structures?

Answer 31

Traditional hierarchical structure
Flatter hierarchical structure
The circle
The wheel
The matrix or all channel network

Question 32

What is the flatter hierarchical structure?

Answer 32

The span of control is wider, the chain of command is shorter and there are a few layers in the hierarchy. If existing traditional businesses want to achieve this structure, delayering must occur. Delayering means the removal of whole layers of hierarchy and management. This is normally achieved through compulsory redundancy programmes.

Question 33

What is the traditional hierarchical structure?

Answer 33

There are many layers to the hierarchy and the span of control is narrow (2 or 4) at the top, but will widen at the bottom (perhaps 7 to 10). At the top of hierarchy are the senior management. At the bottom, the workers in between the middle management and supervisors.

Question 34

What is the circle structure?

Answer 34

In this structure, departments and individuals can only communicate with the two others adjacent to them in the circle. This type of communication can occur between middle managers from different functional departments.

Question 35

What is the wheel structure?

Answer 35

In this structure there is a person, or group, or department that occupies a central position. This is a good problem solving network with lots of potential input to a central coordinator.

Question 36

What is the matrix or all channel network?

Answer 36

This is best used in small groups, and often used to solve complex problems. For this structure to work effectively, firms will have to take advantage of information technology. For example, this structure is ideal if there are workers in a business, who need to interact but are spread geographically. Email or video conferencing systems allow regular contact between members and he passing of information to all members of the structure.